classicfandomcom-20200222-history
Hong Kong Phooey
Hanna-Barbera shows were always based on things that were popular at the time and as you can guess, in 1974 Kung Fu was very popular in the USA. As this was the time when Bruce Lee was making movies and the series called 'Kung Fu' was being shown, starring David Carradine. Joe Barbera had always liked dogs and was always taking every opportunity to cast one in their shows. So that is one of the main reasons why Hong Kong Phooey is a dog (+ they are cute and cuddly). But he wasn't always going to be called Hong Kong Phooey and instead he was going to be called Kung Phooey. The team that worked on Hong Kong Phooey thrived on the show. It was like a group of friends, as they all got on with each other and had lots of fun. They came up with quick ideas and had lots of good banter. At the time, the writers used to draw their scripts, which made the storyboard artists fairly redundant and instead they took on a role of editors, who would edit the storyboards down into scenes and re draw areas that needed to. Also Hanna-Barbera liked to trial other ideas in their existing shows, a sort of pilot within a show. This happened in the last Hong Kong Phooey episode where 'Posse Impossible' was seen for the first time. Hong Kong Phooey wasn't seen for most of the episode, but Posse Impossible went on to star in their own show (minus a few things). Hong Kong Phooey used old story settings, such as an animal who lives and talks in a human world where no one thinks it's out of the ordinary. Also the style of the backgrounds was very oriental. Hong Kong Phooey is one of the classic shows most people remember. This isn't just down to the brilliant animation, it has to do with a catchy title sequence which everyone wants to sing along to (and can't get out of their head) plus the fantastic voice of Hong Kong Phooey, supplied by Scatman Crothers. There were a total of 16 episodes, which mostly contained 2 stories. While I was growing up, I always thought the Janitor was called Henry, but shock horror, it seems that his name was Penry. Most people I tell this to don't believe me (it sounds a stupid name to me!). Look out for where the vending machine is in episode 1, as it is on the left hand side of the room, but for all other episodes it has switched to the right side of the room. Cartoon Network even commissioned a 'flash' cartoon which gave us a short updated version of Hong Kong Phooey. I would advise against watching it, as it didn't have any of the style of the original and looked more like an episode of Street Fighter or Dragon Ball. Now if they created a new series that mirrored the style of the original, then that would be worth seeing.